3 different types of stress and how they affect your body

The body, and especially the nervous system, have to adapt all day long to the world and stresses you are exposed to. Most of your energy is used to maintain a state of homeostasis, which is a state of balance. With this, the body tries to keep the ‘inside’ environment at the best levels for you to function; for example, when it’s hot outside and you sweat to cool down, or when you eat and drink lots of acidic food and your body releases calcium (Ca2+) from the bones to maintain a fairly neutral pH level, and so on.There are three main types of stress that influence the body:1) PHYSICAL STRESSThis will affect the body through postures and positions that you have on a day-to-day basis. The effect varies depending on your actions and activities, or even a lack of the aforementioned. Everyone understands that a proper work environment and ergonomic habits are needed to keep stress low, and this is especially true for manual workers. If you lift too heavy, constantly twist or use repetitive motions, these factors can all cause injury. However, most people – especially when being sedentary – do not think about it as being a physical stress. Add in the fact we tend to sit when we eat, drive, watch TV, read and more, and this large lack of motion simply creates another great physical stress your body will have to deal with.2) CHEMICAL STRESSBoth man-made and natural chemicals will affect the body and, in excess, will cause a stress response. Natural allergens, such as sugar, dairy, gluten and other foods, can create stress through the reactions they cause in the body but for the most part, these can easily be avoided. What is more difficult to avoid are the many synthetic chemicals that surround us every day. Chemicals are found everywhere, and sometimes where you least expect it – they’re in the paint in our walls, the dyes of our clothes, the cleaning products we use, and even in the foods that we eat. Many people would manage if they only had to deal with one or two forms of chemical stress at a time, but if your body has to deal with multiple forms at the one time, your nervous system can become overloaded and cannot defend you enough to prevent a reaction occurring in the body.3) EMOTIONAL STRESSOn a day-to-day basis, how often do your emotions change? We are not robots so we all are likely to experience an array of emotions (anger, sadness, happiness, fear, joy…), and at any given time. We have emotions for a reason – they serve a purpose in short- as well as long-term situations – but if you cannot go through them in a natural manner and are ‘stuck’ in one continual chronic state it will put pressure on your body and cause stress. The stress hormone cortisol is released through the body to increase performance in the short term, but in the long term it can cause havoc, including poor sleep, weight gain, diabetes, heart disease, osteoporosis and anxiety attacks.Stresses are good as they have helped us to survive since early times, but today the stresses we have are much more complex than being able to outrun or fight a tiger! Most stresses do not manifest physically, so what happens is the stress becomes a chronic irritator. As Hans Selve, father of modern stress psychology, said: “It is not the stress that kills us; it is our reaction to it."The major parts of our body that help us adapt to stress are the brain and the nervous system. And we can choose to either move away from chronic illness or towards it.If you have too many toxins or bad stressors in or around you, they will have a direct effect on how you express genes. It is widely thought the whole genome we are born with will never change. However, this thinking has been proven to be incorrect, as the environment does play an important role in which genes you express and which you do not. This is why stressors such as chemical (toxins), physical (traumas) and emotional (thoughts) do affect how you express genes and yourself.Chiropractic adjustments, physical exercise and positive, loving thoughts will all help to create a better quality input to the nervous system. This good input will enhance healing, growth and balanced (homeostatic) body function.Health is simple – it really boils down to balance of function at a cellular level. A healthy life is therefore based on an optimal input throughout our lives of good nervous system function, good behaviours, thoughts and nourishment. Your body can heal from upside down and inside out and you can become a better version of yourself, allowing you to achieve those goals that were so unthinkable in the past.So come in and get checked out, and let us help you destress and achieve your goals!This article was written by Dr. Michael Lezuo (Chiropractor) - @drmichaelchiro.